


Chemistry Plus Timing (or: you know it's fiction because one of them cooks)

by LittleMousling, moogle62



Series: CM Chatfic [16]
Category: Crooked Media RPF
Genre: Commitment, Established Relationship, Love, M/M, Marriage Proposal, dumb jokes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-02
Updated: 2019-11-02
Packaged: 2021-01-20 14:50:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,265
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21283499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleMousling/pseuds/LittleMousling, https://archiveofourown.org/users/moogle62/pseuds/moogle62
Summary: There’s a question, and also a ring.
Relationships: Ronan Farrow/Jon Lovett
Series: CM Chatfic [16]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1231541
Comments: 9
Kudos: 127





	Chemistry Plus Timing (or: you know it's fiction because one of them cooks)

**Author's Note:**

> We wrote this months ago and weren’t at all expecting to be so wonderfully jossed. If you’re as in the mood for sappy, happy Ronan/Lovett as we are, enjoy this inaccurate proposal story!

This is not how Lovett was expecting his evening to go. If he thinks about it, now, maybe he should have suspected something, but no, nope, this one passed him by.

This exact part, kissing his way down Ronan’s chest, this part isn’t exactly an oddity. He’s taking his time more, lingering to feel out Ronan’s soft skin and hear the little breathing sounds he makes, but still, overall, this part isn’t new. Just—everything leading up to it. Everything that made it feel so completely necessary to drag Roman into the bedroom and suck him off until he can’t breathe. Lovett’s getting to that part.

He's getting there more slowly than the burning need under his skin would like, but that's part of it, stringing this out. It's sort of a claim on its own, that they wait for each other, tease it out.

“Love you,” Ronan murmurs, not for the first time since Lovett moved away from kissing his mouth. Not for the third time, either. Lovett almost dips back up to kiss him again, to look in his eyes and feel the weight of it, but he keeps getting distracted, and he _is_ on a mission, here.

Well—maybe just for a second. “Hey,” Ronan says when Lovett leans up, and he puts a hand on Lovett’s cheek.

Lovett pauses, tilting his head into Ronan's touch. He can feel the ring, new and cooler than Ronan's skin still, against his cheek. It's—he likes it. It feels _good_.

“Love you too,” he murmurs into the palm of Ronan’s hand, and drops a kiss there. “Stupidly much.”

“Uh-huh,” Ronan agrees, smiling softly. “That’s us. Couple of stupid, sappy nerds.”

“This stupid, sappy nerd is gonna get farther on blowing you if you stop distracting me,” Lovett tells him.

“No promises,” Ronan says, and pulls him in to kiss.

Ronan's shirtless—Lovett saw to that before they even got into the bedroom—and Lovett's t-shirt has ridden all the way up, so they're skin to skin most of the way. Lovett thinks he read somewhere, or that one of his crunchier LA friends told him, that really loving someone meant you'd be happy to stick belly-to-belly with them forever and while that's objectively disgusting, maybe—if it was Ronan—

“Love you," he mumbles, and rolls his hips.

Maybe—god. Maybe he wants to fuck Ronan, after. He just wants to be close to him, to try to put some of these stupid, sappy feelings into action. To make Ronan feel amazing, the way Ronan made him feel amazing tonight.

Tomorrow, they can tell people. Tonight—tonight, Lovett wants this, the two of them. He wants to kiss his—his fiancé, holy shit—and keep him close, make him feel as known and loved as Lovett does.

And also to suck his dick. That's becoming a pressing outlet for his emotional expression.

*** 

_Earlier_

Even though it’s becoming more common, leaving Pundit at home with Ronan still feels strange. Mostly, he doesn’t; Ronan needs more flexibility to run out the door and hop a plane, or at least to meet a local source or take an HBO meeting. Pundit usually still goes to the office with Lovett. Today, though, Ronan had requested her, and so Lovett’s feeling strange getting out of the car after work, like he’s forgotten something important.

He's used to her snuffling around his feet—a tripping hazard, Tommy called her once, the cutest tripping hazard he'd ever seen, so he was half right—and he's thinking about that when he unlocks the door, listening out for the tap of her paws down the hall.

She likes days with Ronan; he knows because she doesn’t come running, frantic, when he gets home, the way she does after being left alone for a while. She’s happy to see him, but not desperate for love. Today, she’s padding towards him cheerful and fast. She’s wearing a new bow-tie on her collar, one Lovett didn’t buy. “Cute bow-tie,” he calls into the house, not much caring whether Ronan’s in range to actually hear him. It’ll come up again, if not. “Hey, good girl,” he tells Pundit, quieter, and scratches behind her ears.

The house smells good, like baking, rich and warm, and just as he thinks about it, Ronan appears out of the kitchen, smiling.

Smiling and dressed up a little. Apparently it’s date night. Lovett doesn’t remember them planning one, but he’s game. “Are we going out? Lemme walk her and I’ll change.”

“No, I got dinner for us,” Ronan says. “Uh, go sit down?” He gestures towards the dining room instead of the kitchen, which, okay, sure. Date night at home.

The first thing Lovett notices, when he goes where he's pointed, is that the dining table is clear of all the stuff that usually piles up on it, mail of varying age and importance, things Lovett puts down and forgets to pick back up. The second is the flowers in the centre, all in perfect bloom, pinks and blues and whites, the kind Lovett learned he liked when he was helping Emily plan her wedding.

Lovett almost, almost says, "Okay, what did you do?" but something stops him. He says, instead, "I can go put a real shirt on."

"Nah," Ronan says. "You're okay. I'll get the food, you can just relax."

Lovett doesn't think being told they can relax has ever actually made anyone feel more relaxed, but Ronan's smile is soft, the one that's just for Lovett, and that's just as good—better, even—at getting right to Lovett's core, warming and full of trust. There's flour on Ronan's cheek, Lovett realises, and he reaches out to brush it off. "All right," he says, lingering a little, caught in the atmosphere of it, the flowers and Pundit's adorable bowtie and the good home smell of whatever Ronan's baking. "I'll be here."

It's a few minutes, maybe fifteen; Lovett zones out on his phone, getting in the twitter time he knows he won't want to have once Ronan's back with him.

That's been their pact for years, and it's relaxed now they're together so much, but it's still—it's good. He likes it. He likes being the subject of Ronan's full attention, and he's never gotten over wanting that since the first time they met. That he still gets it, still gets the full scope of Ronan's interest and curiosity and humor, is something he tries never to take for granted.

When Ronan comes back, he's wearing oven mitts and carrying two—somethings, in small bowls Lovett swears they didn't own before. "I, uh, thought we could do dessert first," Ronan says, and he doesn't sound nervous, exactly, but there's something in his voice that makes Lovett put his phone down on the table.

“Fancy,” he says. “What is it?” Something chocolate, like a mini chocolate cake, towering out of the top of the bowl when Ronan sets it in front of him. “Chocolate soufflé,” Ronan tells him, and sits in his own chair, picks up a fork. “It’s—you should eat it right away.”

“Oh, twist my arm,” Lovett tells him, and accepts the proffered fork.

It's _good_, in a way that has Lovett closing his eyes involuntarily as he takes a bite. He thinks one of the baking shows had an episode about soufflé; apparently they're really difficult. Figures that Ronan would be good at it. "This is great," he says, and when he looks up, Ronan hasn't eaten anything yet. He clears his throat—now he does look nervous, Lovett thinks—and fiddles with his fork for a second, and then—

“I love you,” Ronan says, and Lovett has a half-second’s “what’s wrong?” thought cross his brain before he realizes that no one delivers bad news over chocolate soufflés. “You’re dedicated and open-hearted and hilarious and I never get tired of arguing about politics and playthroughs with you.”

"Me neither," Lovett says, trying to catch up. It sounds like—it sounds kind of like— "I mean, you know, with you.”

Ronan doesn't exactly make a shushing gesture, but something about his whole face successfully shushes Lovett anyway. "Every, uh." Ronan pauses, and Lovett thinks, _he memorized this. He wrote this out ahead of time and he memorized it_ and if he hadn't pretty much picked up on what this is already, he's sure of it now. His chest feels tight—happy tight, heart-growing-three-sizes tight.

Ronan starts again. "Every day we're together is better than the day before, for me. Every new change we make, every plan, it all adds up to my whole life getting better and better, and the best part is knowing I can share it with you. Even when things are awful, they're better because I can lean on you, and when things are wonderful, they're—they wouldn't be half as wonderful if I couldn't tell you about them."

Lovett swallows around the lump in his throat and makes himself stay quiet for this, for Ronan. Ronan says, "You make me feel like we can do anything. You cheat at Mario Kart—" 

"No, I don't!" Lovett squawks, despite himself.

"—even though you pretend you don't, and nothing in the world is better than waking up next to you. Apart from maybe coming home to you." Another pause: goddamn rhetoric, honestly. Who let him be so good at things? "Or beating your high scores, that's pretty great too."

Lovett is going to cry. He's aware that he's not going to make it through this dry-eyed, and, frankly, doesn't even want to try. Ronan makes him feel like he doesn't need to try.

Ronan isn’t done yet. “I love our dog and how much you love her and I want that with—I want us to have kids, because I know you’re gonna be an amazing dad, and you’ll help me make sure they’re not too LA.” Lovett smiles, not quite laughing, and feels tears leaking out of the corners of his eyes. "So, uh," Ronan says, tone shifting up slightly, "what I'm trying to say is—I—would you marry me, Jonathan?”

Lovett hiccups before he can say anything, chest hitching. He wipes his eyes, smiling, and nods. "Yes," he manages, and Ronan's up out of his chair even as Lovett's reaching for him. 

Lovett stands up and pulls Ronan in, hands on Ronan's cheeks. It's a chocolate-flavored kiss, which seems like a nice way to move into the next stage of his life. Ronan really thought that one through, he'll give him that. He draws back enough to say, "I love you. I, uh. I have to tell you something."

"That sounds ominous," Ronan tells him, but he follows it up with quick, darting kisses that make it clear he isn't worried.

Lovett gives into them for a while, looping his arms around Ronan's neck. It's easy to get distracted with Ronan, even when he's got a point to make, in a way that it just isn't with most people. Eventually, he says, "I might have— hang on," and has to disentangle himself. He figures it's easier to show than tell.

He doesn’t have to search, at least, once he persuades Ronan to lean up against the table and not follow him back into their bedroom. He knows exactly where it is, because he only has a few really Ronan-proof hiding spots, and this one is inside the toe of one of his brown dress shoes, DC relics that only barely scrape by as wearable and are never at risk of Ronan borrowing them.

It's still in its box, small and velvet-feeling, and cliché, and picking it up makes Lovett feel the way it's made him feel every day he's held it in the month since he brought it home: like his heart's too big for his chest, that he can't contain all the things he wants to do and say and tell Ronan all at once, the soft things, the true things, the things he already knows.

There’s a reason he’s had it and hasn’t pulled it out. There’s a reason, too, that they’ve both been thinking about this. He doesn’t hide it behind his back as he emerges; Ronan’s done the showmanship part for them both, really. This time, anyway. When they have an actual wedding, Lovett’s gonna kick his ass in the speech competition. It _is_ a competition, as far as he’s concerned. But this isn’t. Ronan’s eyes catch on it right away, as soon as he’s back in the dining room, on the obviousness of the little velvet box.

His mouth makes a vulnerable, happy shape. "No," he says, smiling. "Really?"

“I've had it for a month," Lovett tells him. He can't stop smiling either. Pundit keeps looking between them like she's not sure what's going on, but she knows it's good. "I didn't know what to do with it. Or when to do with it. Or... how."

“To do with it,” Ronan inserts, smile quirking. “I get the theme.”

“I knew the—bigger pieces,” Lovett says. “I know you’re it, you’re—forever, all that jazz.” He should stop talking, but Ronan’s watching him, looking so fucking happy, that it’s impossible to stop. “I knew I wanted to, uh. Never mind, actually.”

Ronan comes over, pressing casually and wonderfully into his space. "I think I do mind, actually," he says, lilting and teasing. "You wanted to what?"

"I, uh—" Lovett squinches up his nose. "Thought about people—when you're flying all over the place being an avenging angel with your, you know, your face looking like that, it would be good to have something that says you're—" He can say _taken_, instead. It's a cop-out, though. "Mine."

Nothing has _changed_, but standing there with the ring box in his hand and Ronan's question still in the air, Lovett feels it more. _Mine_. He is; he's Lovett's, and everyone should see him and know.

"That's—" Ronan doesn't find a word quite as fast as his hand finds Lovett's ass. "Hot. Actually."

Lovett can roll with that. God, he can roll with that, because all of this emotion and commitment is also, somehow, incredibly hot. Maybe that's just Ronan, being close like this, cooking him chocolate soufflés, but he thinks it's something else, too.

The intimacy of it, maybe, of saying _yes_, of standing here and making that promise. Of being wanted like that, in the forever kind of way. Of Ronan wanting the same thing, for people to meet him wherever he is and know that he's taken, to look at his slender hands and see Lovett's mark.

"Yeah?" Lovett says. He can't quite voice all of it, but he can certainly say, "You want everybody to know that all of this is mine?" and run his own hands down Ronan's chest and down to cup his—yeah, there it is—already hard cock.

Ronan sighs out, canting his hips into the touch. "I really fucking do," he says. He's looking at Lovett's mouth, blatantly: fuck, Lovett wants him, in his life and in his bed and in his—other places. Less sentimental ones.

“I’m yours, too,” Lovett tells him, and maybe squeezing his dick isn’t the exact right accompaniment to that sentiment, but he can handle two things at once. “All yours. You wanna carry me over any thresholds?”

"I think I'm supposed to save that for after the wedding," Ronan says, grinning, and Lovett kisses him again, still cupping him through his jeans.

"I'll walk then," Lovett tells him. "Let's—show me I'm yours."

They don't move, though, despite their best intentions. It’s Ronan’s fault, but it’s also nothing Lovett wants to complain about, either, the soft touch on his face and the weight of Ronan’s gaze. They have the rest of their lives for racing into the bedroom.

He _is_ going to get them there. Just—another couple of soft kisses, first. 

He never takes this for granted—the time with Ronan, or Ronan at all—but they don't often do this, the slow sweet trading of kisses like there's nothing else in the world for them to do, like they're not both hard against each other, like Ronan isn't rocking his hips, just slightly, to give them both something, a slow banking ache.

There's the dining-room wall to hold them up, at least, when Lovett starts losing his footing, too focused on kissing to balance. Ronan moves them towards it, and Lovett realizes he's still holding the velvet box, snapped shut again. "Put—god—put this on? Before I drop the box and Pundit thinks it's a chew toy."

Ronan's mouth always looks well used so even a few minutes of kissing encourages it, making his lips redder, drawing the eye. "You should put it on for me," he says. "Please?"

“If this conversation were taped, I’m pretty sure it would sound like you’re talking about lingerie,” Lovett says. Their humor-from-tragedy wiretap jokes have had a couple of years to settle down and just be jokes, without the frisson of fear.

Ronan snickers. “Or a cockring.”

“Hey, if they sold platinum cockrings—“

“This is gold,” Ronan interrupts, holding it up in the light. 

“Sure, but your dick deserves platinum.”

"You say the sweetest things," Ronan tells him. He puts the ring back in Lovett's hand, and holds his own hand out. "Would you?"

Lovett's not sure that's how it works. Is it? He hasn't paid enough attention to heteronormative traditions. He knows during weddings, people put on each other's rings, but the spot where he might have memories of engagements from movies and TV is a blank. Ronan would know, probably, and also, Lovett's in no mood to say no to him right now.

He grasps Ronan's hand gently and angles the ring over the tip of his finger, slides it down. It's nerve-wracking over the knuckle, but then it slides over and into place. Lovett takes a deep breath, staring at it.

"Wow," Ronan says, very quietly. "Look at that."

Lovett isn't sure if he's going to be able to stop looking at it. It was one thing to think about it, that little strip of metal that says _taken_, and another thing to watch himself slide it onto Ronan's finger, to have it sit at the base of Ronan's elegant finger and be there. He wants—he bends his neck and kisses it on a hot impulse, sentiment and something baser.

Ronan's breath catches, and suddenly soft kisses aren't nearly enough for Lovett anymore. He straightens up and uses his grip on Ronan's hand to tug them towards the bedroom, mouth dry with want. "Let's—c'mere, I want—" Everything. Anything. To suck on Ronan's elegant fingers, maybe. To suck Ronan's elegant dick, definitely.

Ronan follows at gratifying speed, and then they're in the bedroom, and Ronan presses him against the door, taking his face in his hands.

"Hey," Ronan says, and Lovett smiles at him, warm all through. Hot, too, all through, and he starts on the buttons of Ronan's shirt before Ronan can distract him too much. He wants his hands on Ronan's skin, the warm solid _here_ of him.

Ronan doesn't make it easy for him, leaning in to kiss his neck in a _particularly_ distracting way, ignoring Lovett's entirely insincere complaints, and then Lovett just shoves the shirt off him, letting it fall to the ground.

Ronan is golden and gleaming in the evening light; he looks unreal, too handsome, too much like Lovett’s desperate teenage fantasies. Then he’s kissing Lovett on the tip of the nose, and Lovett remembers he’s also, maybe more than that, a giant dork behind the improbable Hollywood looks.

He's _Lovett's_ giant dork, and Lovett has to back him onto the bed, push him down onto the mattress. Ronan lets himself be pushed, bouncing, beaming, and Lovett crawls straight on up after him, straddling his hips.

He means to get on with it, he really does. He means to focus, to show Ronan how intense this all feels through the medium of a really thorough blowjob—one of his favorite mediums for self-expression—but. But Ronan keeps distracting him with soft touches and softer words and Lovett ends up just leaning up over him, kissing him, distracted. 

“Love you,” Ronan murmurs, not for the first time since Lovett moved away from kissing his mouth. Not for the third time, either. Lovett almost dips back up to kiss him again, to look in his eyes and feel the weight of it, but he keeps getting distracted, and he _is_ on a mission, here.

Well—maybe just for a second. “Hey,” Ronan says when Lovett leans up, and he puts a hand on Lovett’s cheek.

Lovett pauses, tilting his head into Ronan's touch. He can feel the ring, new and cooler than Ronan's skin still, against his cheek. It's—he likes it. It feels _good_.

“Love you too,” he murmurs into the palm of Ronan’s hand, and drops a kiss there. “Stupidly much.”

“Uh-huh,” Ronan agrees, smiling softly. “That’s us. Couple of stupid, sappy nerds.”

“This stupid, sappy nerd is gonna get farther on blowing you if you stop distracting me,” Lovett tells him.

“No promises,” Ronan says, and pulls him in to kiss.

Lovett can’t keep anything he’s feeling inside him, right now. “I love you,” he says again. 

“We should—I want to keep kissing you,” Ronan says. “We should do something else.”

"I want to keep kissing you," Lovett says. It comes out as half a complaint: his life is so difficult with his hot—his hot fiancé that he can just keep kissing, that he can grind down against like this, watch him go pink in a way no one else ever gets, that he edits out of every photo. He kisses Ronan again, just to make his point. "I also want to suck your dick. Tell me what we should do."

“I—god. That’s just a cruel choice,” Ronan says, half a groan, and pulls him in to kiss some more. Lovett’s lost in it, options almost forgotten, when Ronan pulls back and says, “Yeah. Okay. Suck me, Jonathan.”

Ronan doesn't have to tell him twice. Or, well, sometimes he does—sometimes Lovett wants to be told twice, or three times, or more; to be _made_—but right now he just wants to kiss back to Ronan's chest, down the soft curve of his belly, to press his face against the outline of Ronan's cock, hard in his neat pants, and mouth at it, feeling it out.

Ronan doesn’t interrupt this time, except to stroke his fingertips through Lovett’s hair, which feels more like encouragement. “Yeah,” Lovett mumbles, and gets his knees under him enough that it’s easy to pop Ronan’s button and carefully lower his zipper.

Ronan's wearing—fuck, he's wearing _Lovett's_ underwear. Between them, that’s an easy version of fancy underwear, simpler than lace or barely-there jockstraps for someone who might have to dash off somewhere unexpectedly. Lovett's pretty sure Ronan's not planning on running off anywhere any time soon, so today this is just for them. A message only they understand.

"Okay, you have my attention," he says, and Ronan laughs, softly.

“I didn't have it before? Because I kind of thought the chocolate soufflés, at least, if not the actual proposal—"

Lovett responds by putting his mouth over the head of Ronan's cock, right through the thin cotton-spandex that's barely containing it. Ronan shuts up, his hand tightening in Lovett's hair, and Lovett has to fight a pleased grin.

He tugs a little against Ronan's grip, enough to encourage it, and Ronan tightens his fingers enough that Lovett groans, open-mouthed. Fuck. Fuck, they just—they work so well together, know each other so well. Hot for intimacy: the not so unexpected Jon Lovett story.

Ronan wearing his underwear is hot, but not so hot he wouldn’t rather peel it off at this point. Ronan lifts up to help, and Lovett takes the opportunity to feel out the dimples in his ass that get deeper when he moves like that. If the Syosset High class of 2000 could see him now—well, they’d probably focus more on “see, we knew he was a cocksucker” and less on the parts that make Lovett glow with happiness, so fuck them, really.

He has to shift away to work the underwear off Ronan's legs, help him kick them off, which means when he turns back he gets the full view: Ronan, naked on their bed, mussed and red-mouthed and smiling so wide, propping himself up on his elbows, waiting for him.

Every part of him makes Lovett’s blood race. And Ronan wants every part of him to be Lovett’s, forever. “Get—grab me the—“ Lovett just points, throat suddenly dry with want, but Ronan smirks and rolls toward the nightstand, tosses the lube next to him.

Lovett picks the tube up, slicks his fingers, and Ronan spreads his legs showily, part invitation, part challenge. He's so—he's just so—

Lovett knees up closer. "You're so fucking hot," he says, because how can he not.

“Says you, down there looking like the promise of everything good in the whole world.” It comes out of Ronan like it was meant to be dirty talk, but it lands entirely differently, earnest and adoring. Lovett’s face is hot, and he buries it in Ronan’s inner thigh.

While he's there, he takes advantage, kissing the soft skin there, nipping at it when Ronan hisses approval and tilts his leg, giving Lovett better access. Lovett could spend forever doing this, putting his mouth all over Ronan: he's never felt this possessive with anyone before, the urge to leave marks. Maybe it's the long distance thing. Maybe it's just—the sense of belonging.

Ronan’s hand finding his hair again is a subtle reminder that Lovett has so far promised a blowjob and at least some fingering and hasn’t seriously delivered on either. He hums and kisses the spot he’s been marking and leans up farther.

He catches Ronan’s eye as he pushes two fingertips in, slow and easy. “Yeah?”

Ronan sighs out, slow and smug. "Yeah," he says, and rolls his hips, encouraging Lovett on. "Fuck."

That's the plan, Lovett's thinking. But this, first: his fingers slowly opening Ronan up, and, gaze locked on Ronan's, his mouth dipping back down over the head of Ronan's cock. "Look at you," Ronan murmurs, and presses just gently with the hand on Lovett's head. "You look so good with my dick in your mouth, Jonathan."

Lovett _feels_ so good with Ronan's dick in his mouth. He squeezes Ronan's thigh with his free hand by way of trying to communicate it, crooks his other fingers slightly, enough that Ronan clenches around them. "So good," Ronan says again, and presses a little more.

Lovett lets himself be guided. He doesn’t always, but sometimes it’s exactly what he wants, to have Ronan controlling the blowjob. If Ronan wants to get his feet planted and fuck up into Lovett’s mouth a little, that sounds really fucking good right now.

Lovett tightens his lips, sucks the way he knows Ronan likes, keeps opening Ronan up; his senses have narrowed down just to this, the salt-need taste in his mouth, the heat of Ronan around him, the sound of Ronan trying to keep his breathing steady. This, all for Lovett. For always.

Ronan's hips shift more, pushing up, and Lovett goes with it, lets his eyes flutter closed while he focuses on just this. "That's—that's it," he hears, mumbled, and then a few loose endearments of the kinds they don't often use. Ronan's most common endearment, really, is "Jonathan," and that's all Lovett really needs. But "_sweetheart_," spat out like a curse while Lovett sucks him off—that's pretty good, too.

Lovett pulls off long enough to get more lube, work another finger into Ronan, and Ronan fists the sheets in one hand. Everything he does looks so _good_, Lovett thinks, and then under all of that there's this weird nerd who once talked to Lovett about fish for a whole five hour flight.

Ronan's dick twitches, and Lovett ducks back down. He thinks, _I love you_, and hopes somehow it translates through oral. 

Ronan doesn't go back to rolling his hips or controlling Lovett's movements; he says, instead, "Do you—I'd rather come with you in me, if that's where you're headed."

He doesn't always; sometimes he's easy for coming first and languidly accepting the fuck after. Sometimes he manages twice, although less these days than in their first few years together. Lovett gets it, though. He'd rather—he wants them working together, tonight.

He pulls back, and works his fingers gently out so he can lean up to kiss Ronan again properly. "Yeah," he says, as Ronan tugs him closer. "Let's do that, fuck."

Ronan doesn’t let him up, kissing the corners of his mouth and the line of his jaw, until Lovett says, “C’mon, lemme—you can’t be this damned perfect and keep distracting me from getting inside you.”

_Perfect_ might not be the adjective a less fevered version of his brain would have picked, but he doesn’t take it back.

The smug tenor to Ronan's next few kisses tells him that Ronan noticed, but he doesn't say anything about it either. Ronan rocks his hips up again, kissing Lovett's neck right where he's most sensitive, says, "All right. Inside me now."

Lovett groans, wanting Ronan’s mouth on his neck almost as much as—okay, no, not as much as he wants to fuck. God. Fuck his—his _fiancé_. He tugs Ronan’s leg up and out, and Ronan moves the other, making space for him. Inviting him.

Lovett can't help but think of the first time they did this, the first time he opened Ronan up for him, the first time he lined up, Ronan curling a leg over his hip. They were so young, he thinks, and they didn't know—or maybe they did, maybe they always knew, somehow, they were heading here. The two of them. A team.

He has to lean back, losing the touch of Ronan's mouth, but then he's rubbing one thumb against Ronan's hole, soft and wet with lube, and Ronan's groaning, "That's—yeah. Want you in me."

Nine times out of ten, Lovett's response to that is "oh, pull my arm," or something else joking, a little sarcastic. Anyone would—no one in the world would need encouragement to want this, to want Ronan to let them in. That's all he's ever joking about, and they both know it. He still shuts up, today, and just gives Ronan what he's asking for.

Ronan tips his head back as Lovett pushes in, his pretty mouth falling open on a groan. "God," he says, and reaches for Lovett, running his hands over his sides, his shoulders. Ronan likes to touch.

Lovett has to shut his eyes for a moment, just feeling Ronan's hands on him and the impossible, beautiful press of his body around Lovett's cock. 

It's amazing, that he gets this: Ronan opening for him, taking him, tight around him. They're both breathing hard when Lovett is all the way there, and he pauses to give Ronan a second, to let him adjust. If only Lovett could fuck him _and_ eat him out, he thinks, on a fleeting desire. If only he could trace his tongue around where they're joined and lick the thin skin stretched around him, give Ronan that too.

He gets the pad of his thumb back there, at least, just barely touching, just enough to make Ronan think about it too, maybe. "Love you," he mumbles, and shifts a little, just testing.

"Gimme a sec," Ronan says, and Lovett holds still, blinks his eyes open to look down at the way Ronan's licking his bottom lip, focused on opening up for Lovett.

Lovett could make a joke here too but he doesn't, just holds himself still and watches Ronan smile up at him, cheeks pink. He wouldn't take a selfie with his hair like that, Lovett thinks, and smiles back, helplessly.

"You're cute," he says, and Ronan looks up at him, eyebrows up, ready to be amused. Maybe Lovett looks earnest—god, of course he looks earnest—because Ronan's face softens into a smile.

“You're cuter," Ronan tells him. "Fuck me now, please."

As if Lovett would ever say no to that at this moment, buried inside Ronan. Ronan squeezes around him like punctuation, like he's making a point, and Lovett's laughing as he slides out and back again, overcome with it, with love and fondness and _how fucking hot this is_.

Ronan always moves with him; it must be instinctual, because he does it no matter how tired or stoned or relaxed they are. His hips roll up, and Lovett matches him with one gentle stroke and then another. He thinks, _He’ll be just like this when we’re eighty._

And then, _Well. Probably less flexible._

It's a good thought, that they'll be doing this when they're eighty—or doing whatever like this they can—that they'll be together, then, a future stretching out from this bed to the horizon. Ronan rolls his hips again, and Lovett is abruptly back in the now. It's pretty fucking perfect here too.

There’s probably a version of tonight with languid strokes, so slow it feels impossible. The real tonight, though, is Lovett shoving in hard and craning down to kiss the closest bit of Ronan’s mouth, messy and insufficient. “Yeah, c’mon,” Ronan agrees, stretching up and grabbing the back of Lovett’s neck to keep him there.

Lovett doesn’t have a lot of leverage, but suddenly all the time spent working on his core in the early hours of the morning seem worth it, because he can snap his hips harder, give them both what they need.

"That's it, jesus, just like that," Ronan mutters, between kisses. Lovett hauls another pillow over and does his best to shove it under Ronan's head, keeping him in easy kissing range. This is the sweet spot, really, when they've both still got enough focus to kiss for real, Ronan's teeth and his tongue grazing the sensitive skin of Lovett's lips.

Ronan bites, sometimes—Lovett's even taken Emily up on her offer of concealer before work, sometimes—and the hint of teeth always makes Lovett's need ramp up now, a reminder of all the times Ronan has wanted him enough to leave a mark. Like marriage, he guess, in a weird way. Marking him up as Ronan's, for anyone to see.

Lovett's getting up a rhythm now, settling into it—both of them are, Ronan rocking against him. Ronan's mumbling, more a string of words than anything that quite constitutes a sentence: "Just like—love—harder, it's—god—" It's the best kind of praise when Ronan's big, beautiful brain goes offline.

Lovett needs both of his hands to keep himself up, keep his balance, but he knows Ronan likes his dick stroked while he's getting fucked, and, selfishly, wants to feel him squeeze down with it, with the ache of that overwhelming sensation.

"Can you," Lovett pants, and Ronan gets what he means at once, and there's a moment while Ronan shifts to make that work where they both lose rhythm but then— "Oh fuck," Lovett manages, and kisses Ronan again, messier.

Ronan's hand is awkward between them, bumping Lovett every time he moves. That's—Lovett's been wired for years to find Ronan jacking off the hottest thing in the world, and this is no exception. This is the physical equivalent of those grainy Skype images, the bumps of knuckles on belly that mean Ronan's fisting himself. 

Lovett can't see properly without shifting, losing his balance, but the feel of it is more than good enough. Ronan's starting to breathe in pants, working for it: Lovett wants to watch him come, right here, for Lovett, for both of them, wants to feel it splash between them, feel Ronan come around him.

“You feel really fucking good,” Lovett tells him, kissing his ear and his hairline. “Always—feel so good, baby.”

Ronan swears, hips jerking out of rhythm. He’s getting close, and Lovett wants him to get off just like this, with Lovett fucking him deep and steady.

"You going to make me come?" Ronan asks, strained, hand still working. "Now that you've put a ring on it?"

Lovett gasps a laugh, trying to keep his rhythm. "Yeah," he says, and then, the words just falling out of him, "love you, I love you, wanna watch you come."

Lovett leans up to give Ronan more room to work, shifting his knees on the bed just enough to make them both groan at the change in position. From here he can’t kiss Ronan but he can watch his hand moving on his cock, fast and gorgeous, and the way he’s taking Lovett’s dick.

"So hot," Lovett tells him, and it's the most generic thing he could say but it doesn't _feel_ generic right now, with Ronan's hand twisting on his dick and Ronan's face pink and screwing up. "So fucking hot, let me see you."

Ronan grunts, an inelegant sound that goes with his inelegant arousal face and the inelegant efficiency movement of his hand, all of it open for Lovett to watch. All of it so different from the polished Ronan everyone else gets. Ronan like this, reduced to just the desperate needs of his id—only Lovett gets this Ronan.

He thinks he can be forgiven for this surge of possessiveness when they're literally—when they're _engaged_, fuck, they're committed, they're—they _belong_ together, and only Lovett gets to know the way Ronan starts to hold his breath when he gets close, when he's riding an edge of desperation.

"Show me," Lovett breathes, keeping his hips moving, trying to, just for a moment, ignore his own frantically building need, "for me, Ro, for me, c'mon," and Ronan grunts again, all the air rushing out of him, and starts to come.

It's gorgeous, mesmerizing, the spurt of come over Ronan's delicate fingers, the way his whole body jerks with it. It's a sight that's been fundamentally wired to Lovett's libido over the years, that still gets him every fucking time. "Fuck, I—I need—" he gasps, and Ronan's eyes blink open, finding his.

Lovett's hanging on by a thread, but he needs—even with the agonisingly wonderful feeling of Ronan squeezing around him all through his orgasm, he needs—but Ronan knows. He reaches a hand up to cup Lovett's jaw, tender, just as possessive as Lovett feels. "You can come," he says.

Lovett almost chokes on how fast it hits him, gasping and squeezing his eyes shut and, _god_, filling Ronan up. He feels Ronan’s hand on him like a reverse brand, almost cold against the heat of his face.

He loses any hope of rhythm at all, hips just jerking through it as he pants, turning his face into Ronan's palm."You're so good," Ronan is saying, soft and breathless, "so fucking good, that's it."

Lovett curls up around him, forehead hot on Ronan's skin, and breathes for a long moment while Ronan pets his hair. "Okay. Okay, I'll—god."

“You can take a second," Ronan tells him, and Lovett breathes deeper and does take it, coming back to earth, not quite ready to pull out.

Ronan keeps stroking his hair, open-palmed, cupping the back of Lovett's head until Lovett feels together enough, slipping out of Ronan when he's almost too sensitive to do it, and putting his face back in Ronan's neck, holding on to him.

“So... I’m glad I didn’t put the salmon in the oven,” Ronan says, after a few quiet minutes. “You wanna get up and eat dinner?”

“No,” Lovett says, but he guesses he does. “Just this. This is good.”

“You don’t have to conserve this.” Ronan sounds a little giddy, the way he sometimes gets after good sex. “We can just have this again. Like, forever. That’s kind of what I was getting at with the soufflés and the proposal.”

"Are the soufflés going to be a regular thing now," Lovett asks, still into Ronan's neck, "because that definitely seems like a key part of the proposal offer to mention upfront. Incentivizing."

"I'm never making them again," Ronan says, sounding _very_ sure. Then, softer, "But I did find a really easy recipe for those—what are they called—restaurants always have them. The chocolate things with liquid in the middle. Volcano... tarts."

Lovett lifts his head just long enough to shoot Ronan an unimpressed look. Well, he aims for unimpressed. It lands as fond, he's pretty sure. "Lava cakes?"

"Lava cakes! Yes. Those. I might be induced to make those, sometimes, given enough motivation and support."

"I'm very good at support when there's something in it for me," Lovett says, which is a lie and they both know it. He's very good at support, period, Ronan has told him, which Lovett tries to remember when Ronan's been working for 36 hours and won't take a break and Lovett's temper is fraying. "Especially cake somethings. Or tart somethings, you know?"

Ronan makes a spectacularly unimpressed face that has them both laughing, and when they're quieter, Lovett's stomach rumbles. "Uh," he says. "What was that about dinner?"

"Salmon, asparagus, and wild rice," Ronan tells him, looking very pleased with himself. "A Mia special. I got her to show me how to make it when I was at the farm last month. Well, the rice is just instant from a bag."

"Unacceptable," Lovett says, kissing him to take the sting out of the joke. "I accept only home-grown rice. Build a rice paddy in the backyard or don't even suggest it. What kind of fiancé are you?"

"Your fiancé," Ronan says. It definitely comes out softer than he thought, judging by the look on his face, and Lovett has to kiss him again for that, and then again because he catches sight of Ronan's new ring, and then again, just because. Ronan ends up pink and still pleased.

"This is very heteronormative of us," Lovett mumbles against Ronan's warm mouth.

"Uh-huh," Ronan agrees. Or maybe doesn't, because he adds, "It especially felt heteronormative while you were fucking me through the mattress."

That reminds Lovett. "Speaking of heteronormative," he says, "uh, we should—tell Jon and Tommy. Emily first, though, or—"

Any other man might be offended by his new fiancé bringing up other men in bed, but then, Lovett wouldn't be marrying any other man. "Oh, no, definitely Emily first," Ronan says. "Do you... I could put that salmon in the oven and you could call her?"

They're still naked. The bedroom smells of sex. Lovett loves him so much, for everything, and for understanding... whatever his friendship group is. His family, really.

"Yeah. And my mom. She knows I was—thinking about it. I won't take too long." He wants to sit down to dinner with Ronan, just them, everyone else out of the room again for a while. But these calls, first.

"I'll come and bug you when the food's ready," Ronan promises, and Lovett moves off him enough to let Ronan stand up. He pauses there a second, naked and gorgeous in the muted light through the shades. "Love you."

"Love me by making me food," Lovett says, and, as Ronan grins and grabs his pants, "Love you, too."


End file.
